Business Presentation Skills for Consultants 6: Creating Compelling Headlines and Slide Titles

Learn to transform boring slide titles into compelling headlines that capture executive attention and drive engagement throughout your presentation.

Introduction

This is Lesson 6 of The English Farm's Professional English Courses presentation series. Learn how to create compelling headlines and slide titles through our specialized Business English training. 

Look at the following presentation slide titles. Do you think they are good or bad?

  1. Marketing Strategy Update

  2. Q3 Performance Review

  3. Brand Positioning Overview

  4. Digital Metrics and KPIs

  5. Customer Insights Report

  6. Social Media Analysis

  7. Marketing Plan 2025 

Warm Up

Professional English skills include transforming boring titles into engaging headlines. This exercise will help you learn professional English techniques for maximum impact.

Try to transform the titles from the Introduction section into one that shows urgency and sparks interest. The first one has been done for you.

Original Titles Reworked Titles
Marketing Strategy Update e.g., What’s Working? What’s Not?: A clear path forward for marketing wins
Q3 Performance Review  
Brand Positioning Overview  
Digital Metrics and KPIs  
Customer Insights Report  
Social Media Analysis  
Marketing Plan 2025  
Language

There are a few tips on making titles more captivating for your audience. 

  1. Focus on outcomes, not activities: Clients don’t care about what you did—they care about what it means for them. Titles should clearly show value, impact, or results.
    • Instead of "Strategy Overview," use "The Strategy that will drive the next-quarter growth."
    • Mini Task: Change the following title into an outcome-focused one. “Report on Email Ad Results”
       
  2. Use action verbs instead of nouns: Verbs are used to show energy and direction. They turn a boring report into a story of movement—toward a goal or away from a problem.
    • Instead of “Customer Feedback Summary,” use “Turning feedback into competitive advantage.”
    • Mini Task: Change the following title into one that uses an action verb. “The User's Website Experience”
       
  3. Ask a strategic or provocative question: Good questions signal strategic thinking and encourage participation. They open up conversations.
    • Instead of “Market Trends Q3,” use “Are we ahead of the curve—or catching up?”
    • Mini Task: Change the following title into a strategic question. “Analysis of Channel Performance”
       
  4. Add tension, surprise, or contrast: Tension makes people interested. A surprising insight or contrast creates a story—and stories are more memorable than mere data.
    • Instead of "Performance Review," use “Great metrics, but a missed opportunity—what we can fix now”
    • Mini Task: Change the following title into one that adds tension, surprise or contrast. “Increasing Customers”

All in all, if you want to get and keep client attention: 

  • Tell them what's in it for them
  • Show action, not just maintenance
  • Invite them to think, not just listen
  • Give a reason to care now

When you master these skills, your presentations will stand out in any business setting.

Practice

Apply your knowledge to this real business scenario. 

Look at the following outline with the slide titles in bold. Change them into more compelling, captivating titles. 

1. Introduction

If we start our digital growth plan this quarter, we can get a 6–9 month head start in getting new customers before our competitors do.

2. Why now

  • Competitors are becoming more active. Two of them started small digital projects last quarter.

  • If we wait, we risk:

    • People forgetting our brand.

    • Losing customers to competitors.

3. Where to start

  • We should start in two regions because:

    • Many of our target customers there use digital tools often.

    • It’s cheaper to set up the needed systems.

  • This means we can launch quickly and show results fast.

4. What you gain

  • We expect to make $22 million more in the next 18 months.

  • This will happen because:

    • We will send personalized ads to customers.

    • We will make it easier for customers to buy from us in many ways (online, in-store, etc.).

5. How you’ll do it

  • We already know what technology we need, who will help us, and how long it will take.

  • For Phase 1:

    • We have all the people and tools ready.

    • We can start right away.

6. Conclusion

We are not just making a bold move—we are making a smart, low-risk choice that can start giving results this quarter.

Reflect & Review

You now know how to write headlines that get people's attention. These business English skills will make a real difference in your presentations.

Each slide needs to tell its own story within the overall structure of your pitch deck. You should now have a greater appreciation of how to give your headlines maximum impact and get the audience thinking. Apply this approach over the next week to news stories, television shows, podcasts, and films. How might you rename or retitle the content to make it even more engaging? 

Next Steps

The next lesson will look at the hook and how to entice and engage the audience from the opening slide.